With the Coalition leaving office with a trillion dollars of government debt and nothing to show for it hanging over our heads, no one can deny Australia is in a financial dilemma. There is an immediate pressing problem of affordable and social housing in this country. How best to deal with the housing problem? One effective method, that is sustainable and does not place an additional burden on taxpayers is a Government operated 'Future Fund' with the specific aim of providing affordable and social housing for those Australians locked out of the existing private markets for home ownership and rental accommodation. How does a Future Fund work, simply the government establishes a monetary fund, in our case through taking advantage of low interest rates due to our excellent international credit rating. Then that money can be invested at good returns, providing economic development within Australia, mining, manufacturing a limitless amount of opportunists exist. The net return after all costs have been met by the Future Fund is then used to provide affordable housing for eventually millions of Australians who are being denied that oppertunity at present. Talk of a $100 billion is not unreasonable. MR DUTTON WHAT IS YOUR PROBLEM?

Dear Paul,

What you suggest can be classified as gambling.

It may succeed - but it may crash, there may be initially some good returns, then comes a pandemic or a war, earthquake, floods or fires and bang, the capital is lost, but the extra debt remains (and interest rates are not anymore low, even with the best credit rating).

Houses are not created out of thin air by shuffling numbers, they need to be physically built.

Here is my suggestion:

By reducing regulations, people should be allowed to build their own homes, without the middleman in the form of banks and building companies.

First stop restricting where and what people can build, especially in rural land, so poor people can start building their own shacks there with their own hands, a room at a time, and as they save on rent they can gradually afford to build more rooms, bring in running water and electricity and eventually end up with a decent home completely their own.

Apart from that, if we can manage to reduce the overall population, then there won't even be a need for new buildings because as people die, their homes will become available for others.

Hi Yuyutsu,
"Apart from that, if we can manage to reduce the overall population, then there won't even be a need for new buildings because as people die, their homes will become available for others."

I can see a problem here with your line of thinking.
I think banks would buy up any spare houses and either put them on airbnb at a high rental rate or leave them empty just to ensure a shortage of available dwellings on the market and maintain high prices.

As for how to fix housing, I always said I believe the answer is huge big factories assembling relocatable homes on a production line.
Use ready-made ready-to-assemble cheap imported components, that can be assembled using people on a work for the dole program, and who get paid double dole for full time work.
These people can learn their tasks via an app / prove their skills via a digital resume and who confirm their shifts via the mygov app.

Cut all costs;
Cut component costs, training costs, employment hiring costs and wage costs.

Arrange them like caravan parks, in low density areas with a mini bus service (People can have food delivered these days) and sell the land off and move them further out of urban areas every 10 years or so, that way the government will get a return on the land, so that they can buy more land further out.

Finally, start cracking down on people in government housing who cause problems in their neighbourhoods and damage the houses they're given.
Ban them for 5 years, and after that allow them to reapply, but put them on the bottom of the list with no priority.

Dear Paul,

There's an interesting article from the Grattan Institute
agreeing with your take on this subject. The federal government
should establish a social housing future fund.

The article tells us that the previous Morrison government
made it clear that it regarded social housing as the
responsibility of state governments. Yet the history of
Australia's federation shows that large social programs
from Medicare to post-WW2 expansion of social housing will
only succeed with federal support. This reflects the
imbalance that for every 5 dollars in taxes levied each
year the federal government collects four dollars and the
states only one.

There's more at the following:

http://www.grattan.edu.au/news/a-plan-to-call-home-its-time-for-a-social-housing-future-fund/

Paul,

In Norway the government set up the Government Pension Fund Global (GPFG) so that the wealth benefits generated from they natural resources would provide benefits for both current and future generations.

The first money transfers to the fund took place in 1996.

In 2010, just 14 years later, Prime Minister Rudd proposed a "super profits" tax on the mining industry.

This was one of the major causes of his downfall.

In 2010 the GPFG had a market value of 3.077 billion kroner.

In 2022 the GPFD had a market value of 12.429 billion kroner.

Talk about lost opportunities.

Paul,

I used the European metric notation in those figures.

We would tend to write these figures as 3,077 billion and 12,429 billion.